By Phileas Jusu
Nov. 3, 2021 | Freetown, Sierra leone
About thirty church leaders in Sierra Leone ended a two-day Regional Church Leaders’ Conference in York Village in the Western Area Tuesday October 26. Sponsored by The Faith and Justice Network – a Liberia-based Christian NGO – the conference theme was Covid19 and Beyond – Churches Working Together For A Resilient Mano River Basin.
Alarming statistics from Pastor Dr Germane Getteh’s day two presentation Putting Faith in Action, Defining the Role of the Church as Supporters of Rule of Law and Social Justice at National and Sub-Regional Levels aroused emotions and debate from the church leaders.
“Ten thousand people die everyday because they lack access to affordable healthcare… Each year, 100 million people are forced into extreme poverty due to healthcare costs; men own 50% or more of the world’s wealth than women and the 22 richest men have more wealth than all the women in Africa. Furthermore, unpaid care work done by women is estimated at $10.8 trillion a year – three times the size of the tech industry. So, women work and they do not get paid”, he said, calling the findings “challenging and vexing”.
“According to the United Nations, 783 million people live in extreme poverty. Furthermore, in 2016, almost 10% of the world’s workers lived with their families on less than $1.90c per person per day. Globally, to every 100 men, there are more than 22 women between the ages of 25-34 living in extreme poverty. The social challenges seem to be prevalent on the African continent…”, he said.
Despite all of these academic enquiries and social initiatives, the problem of poverty persists. Those who are most troubled by these unfortunate phenomena are women and children. The data further suggests that people in developing countries take the brunt of the unfortunate circumstances.
Inequality, injustice and unfair distribution of resources are the underlying causes, he said. Gettah encouraged church leaders to endeavor to understand and pursue the concepts of Rule of Law and Social Justice. He led the leaders into detailed discussions that would ground them in knowledge of the Rule of Law and Social Justice. The goal was to appropriately arm them as faith leaders in the fight to pursue the Rule of Law and Social Justice.
Earlier, The Rev Dr Tolbert Thomas Jallah (Jnr) the Regional Executive Director of Faith and Justice Network said that he looked forward to interactive discussions on the involvement of citizens in funding and how funding could be spread out into faith communities in the Mano River Union sub-region for intervention in times of crisis. Jallah said church leaders must be concerned with issues of transparency and accountability of their national governments in administering measures to curb Covid19 and that churches in Sierra Leone should show solidarity to one another and work together through a meaningful role during the pandemic and beyond. He said God is calling on the church to play the role of mediator in a difficult time like Covid19.
CCSL president Henry Samuels implored church leaders to be aware that the people of God are called at this crucial time to respond to Covid19 and position themselves for post-Covid activities. He said it was good for the church to start the process of thinking of what the post-Covid19 activities would look like. He recalled that CCSL had already published a book that addresses post-Covid19 concerns and gives an idea of what the post-covid church would look at.
“We are the hands of God …we are the feet of God; we are the mouth of God. So, we are called to speak on behalf of God; we are called to move for God; we are called to action for God”, he said, emphasizing that the church should remember that those were the roles that God is calling the church to play in their respective communities and nations at such a time like this. He emphasized that the church should move from playing the basic prophetic role to action. “Most times we think about the Government only. But are we going to call the church and our various organizations to be accountable in the way we are operating and when we fix our own problems, then we can call on the government to question?”.
He recalled his visit to Guinea the previous week where his Sierra Leone team engaged the Guinean church to address gender-based violence issues; harmful practices and other sensitive gender issues. “We in Sierra Leone are doing quite well, especially in calling government to attention on the sensitive issues that affect our peoples’ lives… Up to now in that nation, it’s a taboo subject”, Samuels said. He said it was sad that Guinea was still being bound by cultural practices that restrict church authorities from freely discussing sensitive gender issues as if they were a taboo.
He was pleased to report that Sierra Leone was ahead of Guinea in breaking traditional barriers that restrict women’s rights and the freedom to discuss harmful cultural practices.
Church must speak out
“But there is much more work to be done. When we move around communities, we see poverty staring at us everywhere. Can the church remain silent? We see injustice all around us. We see inadequacy or lack of basic facilities around us”, he lamented.
Samuel recalled that in the year under review, the council organized workshops on various issues like Illegal Migration, Water Justice Conference and many more, all in a bid to call government’s attention to the issues. “We have been engaging ministries, departments and agencies concerned with some of the issues we addressed”, he said, citing Water Justice, Education and gender violence. “These are the issues I think God is calling us to address. We are not to keep quiet or remain silent while we see our people suffering”, he stressed.
The president recalled how people engaged in agriculture have their own challenges including accessibility to roads and markets. As a result, he said, farmers are abandoning their communities to come to the cities because their farm products find it difficult to reach the market. Hence they remain poor and farming remains unattractive. The church therefore has to be the voice of the people in addressing the bread and butter issues, he said. The countries of the Mano River Basin have to rise up to their respective governments to be accountable especially at this time of Covid response, the president concluded.
Two other presentations helped participants to reach positions to take in curbing Covid19 and to address post-Covid challenges.
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